Travel Journal

Peace and Quiet

(Thursday 18 September 2014) by Rick Clot

Once again, my wife, a.k.a. "Ziggy", was hard at work battling the unruly forces of nature that seem to pester her wherever she goes. This time she travelled to Chicago with her cousin for five days. They left last Wednesday to attend the 50th wedding anniversary of another cousin in the family and returned Monday of this week. She packed one suitcase for the trip which was, in itself, a minor miracle on it's own merit. Upon arriving at the Phoenix airport she was pleasantly surprised that she was allowed to carry the suitcase on. However, the return flight was a different story. Coming back, she was told the same suitcase was an inch too big and she would have to check it. And pay $25 for the privilege. The baggage Nazis were not lending a sympathetic ear to her cause. So I went down to the Phoenix airport with the other husband to pick up the two weary travelers and waited for them to call us while we parked in the cell phone lot. After the lot was almost completely empty of cars did we call them only to find out that everyone from the flight had gotten their luggage and left. There were only six people left waiting at baggage claim, my wife being one of them. The good side of this is that it wasn't crowded at the terminal when we drove up since everyone else was gone. How does this always happen to one person? Hence the name Ziggy, I guess.